We're All Mad Here
by Punzie the Platypus
Summary: The Divergent world is not real. It's just a figment of Tris's imagination, and Tris is in a mental hospital. Jeanine keeps telling her that a man named Tobias does not exist, but he visits her every night. But Tris knows she's not insane. She knows that Jeanine is a cruel doctor intent to keep her at the mental hospital with her friends. But for what purpose? AU,l TxT.
1. I'm Not Insane

**_Soli Deo gloria_**

**DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own Divergent. AU time. It's modern day, and . . . oh, read the story. :)**

The walls are tall and grey. The floor shines, freshly cleaned, a beautiful white. But the entire place echos with a thousand voices, in and outside of the heads of the crazies in its halls. It looks fairly normal, for its occupants.

Tris Prior is walking down this hall. She feels as if she is going to court, to have a trial and a verdict placed on her head. She walks slowly, almost reluctantly. But she can't stop. Behind her is her orderly, Tori Wu, wearing customary doctor's clothes. She holds a clipboard in her hand, and is keeping pace. She is the only thing that makes Tris keep her feet moving. She'd rather not go to the Office, but seeing as her mouth couldn't shut up, she is on a journey there now.

She wears gray pants and shirt over a white shirt. Her hair is down to her shoulders, and Tori dwarfs her. Still, her arms are folded and a scowl is on her face as she comes to the door at the end of the hall. It is brown and holds a bronze plaque on it. _Office of Dr. Jeanine Matthews._

Tori moves past Tris and gets the door, nodding for Tris to follow her. Tris walks in and sees the usual. Jeanine Matthews, the queen of this little institute, is sitting in a chair behind her desk. Behind her are several bookshelves lined with medical journals. The carpet is blue and holds brown chairs all filled with interns and lesser ranked doctors. Tris can name them all, and she hates each of them with a strange anger—because they all know. They all know that she is perfectly sane, but here they are, convinced that she made everything up. She is here, locked in like some mental person, because they think she lies.

"Beatrice," Jeanine says, her voice as cool as water. She sits up straight, wearing a lab coat and blue shirt, in her desk chair. She is oddly cool about this entire business. Tris always wonders if this is a mask keeping a woman as psychotic as the patients hidden inside.

"Tris," Tris says.

"No. Your name is not Tris. Your name is Beatrice Prior. We have discussed this, Beatrice," Jeanine says, not losing her calm at all. Everything on her is perfectly placed. She reminds Tris of a robot. She has about the same emotions as one. "You are to know yourself as Beatrice."

Tris blinks. "Of course," she lies.

Jeanine nods, obviously pleased that she obeys. "Take a seat, Beatrice."

Tris takes a seat on a plastic chair with a metal backing. Tori stands behind her, ready if she needs to wrestle and sedate her if she acts out. She has done that a few times. Tris has a bubble of anger in her that Jeanine always seems to poke and prod until it breaks; then she lashes out, sarcastic and biting and physically violent against the doctor. She can still see her fingernail claw marks hidden behind a wall of makeup on Jeanine's face.

But at the moment, Tris sees the wisdom in staying calm. Staying calm shows a sign of obedience, but it also worries Jeanine. Tris knows that the woman knows she is perfectly fine. If she acts sane, she can show that she holds a hand of cards against Jeanine. She even smiles. That would confuse her. Toss water on Jeanine's circuits and watch her sputter.

Jeanine leans forward, her hands clasped together on the desk. All the eyes in the room are trained on her. Tris's smile curls a little.

"Beatrice, I am not one willing to play petty games. You and I and everyone else in this room knows that you are not a child or a baby. There is little point in treating you as if you are inane or dumb," Jeanine says firmly.

"Only insane, then?" Tris says evenly.

"So you do admit that you have a problem?" Jeanine asks, grasping her words quickly.

"No. I'm more than willing to admit to me having a problem. But my sanity is more mine than yours is to you," Tris says. Her hands are holding tightly to the bottom of her chair, pressing against the plastic. "I am not insane."

"Denial," Jeanine says, almost dismissively. Her eagle eyes catch each eye of her doctors, and they hastily write on their clipboards. They record everything.

Tris turns her head and watches Caleb as his pencil moves up and down the paper. His green eyes are trained on the paper, quick and eager. And she hates him for it. He is recording a surveillance of a session; he is observing his sister like she is an experiment he can decipher. She is a subject; and he isn't her brother.

She turns back to Jeanine. "Denial?" she says. She laughs a little. "Sure."

"You are clearly not well," Jeanine says. "But that is not something you are to be blamed for. Pity can be applied to your situation."

As if Jeanine has a speck of pity anywhere inside her body. Tris says nothing.

"Beatrice, do you remember what we talked about the last time you were here?" Jeanine asks.

Tris can recall that she was threatened with sedatives. She also knows that Jeanine is leading her into why she is here today. It is because she had been mentioning _him _to other patients.

She shrugs.

"Do you still believe that there is a man who is real, who is, after all, not real?" Jeanine says slowly. "You say that there is a man who comes through your window and talks to you at night. You know that this is a figment of your imagination, don't you, Beatrice?"

Tris remembers the other call to the office perfectly. She had dared to mention to Jeanine about Tobias. How he managed to come through her one-story window and talk to her every night. He did. Does. That is indisputable. But Jeanine attributes this to her cause of being in the insane asylum.

"He exists," Tris says matter-of-factly. "You can say all you want that he isn't real. He actually does exist."

"He does _not_," Jeanine says. Her voice almost sounds angry. Good.

"He does." Tris can recall every moment they had. Every moment from their being together in a dystopian Chicago. And they had thought it was supposed to be a utopia, a place of happiness. That all fell apart when the factions disintegrated. Tris can remember every moment of their trek through Amity to her death sentence in Erudite headquarters, and then beyond the fence to find the Bureau. She can feel a cold chill remembering the death serum entering her lungs, and then three gun shots entering her body. She can remember everything, and Jeanine thinks she is making things up.

"He may exist in a dreamworld that your mind has formulated, but not in reality, Beatrice," Jeanine says, her voice clipped. They have been working on this for some weeks. To see that Tris still doesn't believe her irks her and grates her nerves.

"As if Chicago can be described as being a dreamworld. I wish that were true, Jeanine," Tris says. Because she doesn't want to have died. She had died in Divergent. "But it's not. It is a nightmare. It is a nightmare filled with manipulations of humanity trying to change human genetics and ruining humanity in the process. It's a nightmare showing how corrupt man has become. And you say it's not real."

"Where do you think this idea of this . . . _Divergent _world came from?" Jeanine says slowly. Her pupils can see that she is trying to get down to how the girl had decided to dream of a grey and bloody dystopian Chicago. "Do you suppose that this is a coping mechanization from your trauma?"

Tris frowns. She HIGHLY doubts that this is a world she made because she had seen a bunch of her neighbors get murdered in their front yards. "I didn't come up with the idea. I lived it. I'd rather there never were any factions. They only caused division and dissension between people."

Jeanine sighs. She pulls out a large tan folder and brings out several papers. "From our last session, you say that people from your dream are also people from reality."

"You're the scientist who nearly killed me," Tris says. "And don't deny it. I know the truth. You can say all you want against what is true, but that doesn't change it from what it is." Her torn nails hurt her fingers as she squeezes them harder against the chair. She feels an ill satisfaction from all this. Jeanine is limited in what she can do. She can't deny that she is a scientist capable of killing her for the pursuit of answers.

"That is not true, Beatrice. I am here to help you, not kill you. I am . . . a friend," Jeanine says, professional and slow, trying to find the right words to say to a mental patient.

Being not a mental patient, Tris feels like she is a five-year-old being charged for having a temper tantrum.

"You're the farthest thing from that," Tris says. "Don't lie to me."

"Who else is in your world?" Matthew says, speaking up for the first time. He is an attractive young man, but has an air of thoughtfulness around him.

"You're a scientist at the Bureau, the agency who made the city like it is. You are helpful, though. You helped me save the entire city," Tris says.

"And what about me?" Cara asks slowly.

Tris swallows, and she felt the ache of killing Will all over again. "You are a . . . friend. You help me and Matthew. And a few others."

Nita doesn't ask anything. She only observes and writes.

"Are all your friends in the Divergent world?" Matthew asks. He doesn't see Jeanine's stony face show the slightest tinge of pink anger.

"Will is. Christina is. Robert, Susan. Tori is. Al, Eric, Drew, Molly, Edward, Myra, Peter, even though I wouldn't count them all as friends," Tris says.

"Tris, you have to realize that your mind has made a simulation out of your mind for you to live in so that you don't have to feel and confront all the traumatic effects of what you had seen. You have a form of PTSD. You need to come to grips with reality," Jeanine says. She straightens and clears her throat, realizing that she is getting angrier and angrier. Her hands clasp in front of her. "Is this something you would like to talk about in group therapy?"

"Why not? Everyone already knows," Tris says.

Jeanine blinks. "Excuse me?"

"Christina is angry because she was taken from that world. Will is dead. He knows that. Al committed suicide and feels like he has a second chance."

"Is there a real Tobias that is from your life here who you put in the Divergent world?" Jeanine asks.

"Of course," Tris says. She exhales. She remembers the night Tobias had found her room here in the mental hospital and picked the locks and security system to get through her bedroom's window, which she shares with Christina. He had held her in his arms for the longest time, because he had thought he would never see her again. He kissed her and told her that he went down a zipline to scatter her ashes. She had felt so empty, but to feel him around her once more, she had felt complete. Whole, for once.

"Who is he?"

"Tobias," Tris says.

_"Beatrice," _Jeanine says. Not angrily, though. Insistently. "He does not _exist_!"

Tris laughs.

"Have her discuss this in group therapy," Jeanine says, sighing. She then calls Caleb over and instructs him over what changes they might make to her meds list. Tris rolls her eyes and stands up.

"Can I leave, please?" Tris asks.

"_May _I leave, please," Jeanine says quickly. She is always a stickler for good grammar.

"May I leave, please?" Tris asks.

"If you can behave, yes," Jeanine says. Tris stands up. Tori comes to her side, ready in case she completely and utterly flies off the hook. That is what they expect of her. Sometimes she fights Tori, just to relieve her anger. She keeps too much inside because if she acts out in the slightest manner, Jeanine treats her to some meds and some alone time away from Christina.

"I will. I promise," Tris says. She turns and Tori opens the door. She is going down the hall, feeling eyes from Caleb on her neck. She remembers how he delivered her to the Erudite murder table, and she aches with an urge to clip him upside the jaw.

She goes to the meds station, which has a line dozens of people long. She gets to go to the back. Christina is waiting there for her, her arms folded and her nose wrinkled.

"What'd Jeanine have to say to you now?" Christina asks.

"I'm crazy. Duh," Tris says, her arms also folded. "I am under an obedience command now. So I am going to be perfectly sane."

"I hate it here. Their chocolate cake sucks and this is NOT fashion," Christina says. She lifts up the collar of her grey shirt and sniffs. She turns away and shudders. "Maybe I could actually go insane from living here."

Tris is sure that putting a bunch of mental people in the same place would actually higher the percentage of crazy in each of them. At least her group helps dilute the level of crazy in this place.

Ahead of them, Eric is busy finding personal dosages and handing them to the patients. He impatiently hands them water and checks their hands, pockets and under their tongues before letting them go, making sure that they aren't skimping on their meds, God forbid.

Caleb approaches him and hands him a piece of paper. Eric looks it over and began to open several different meds to combine them into a mixed cocktail.

"Don't they have to have a doctor's word to make up different prescriptions?" Christina asks.

"I'm an exception," Tris says sarcastically.

"You're special, Tris. Jeanine hates your guts," Christina says. She laughs.

"I know. I am the one who ruined her in Erudite," Tris says.

Christina shrugs. "That's true."

Tris can feel the annoyed eyes of Eric when he hands her pile. It is mostly pills for her sanity and insomnia and violent thoughts. They are supposed to calm her down. They sure work, don't they? Tris glares at Eric and drinks her water and slides her sanity pills into the niches between her fingers.

"Expose your hand, Prior," Eric says.

Tris spreads her hand out. Nothing.

"OTHER hand," Eric says, exasperated.

Tris spreads her hand out. Three little pills fall to the floor.

Tori goes to pick them up before someone grabs them and swallows them and Eric presses three more in her hand, saying, "Swallow them. One by one." He takes two away, thinking it a better idea to not give her an idea, and he watches her purposely swallow each one as slowly as she can. He taps his fingers, which held several metal rings, on the counter. He looks the same as he did in Divergent. Overtly oily hair, pierced nose, pierced ears, and a ring in his eyebrow.

"Open your mouth," he says.

She sticks out her tongue.

"Move on," he says.

Tris leaves and joins her group of friends around the TV in the common room. The place has two TVs and a VCR and a stack of DVDs. Some patients are working on some puzzles in a corner. Others are cuddling on the sofas. A few are reading books; one is freaking out over a book and has to have an orderly calm her down.

Across a sofa are piled, like a bunch of seals, Uriah, Marlene, and Lynn. They all look particularly annoyed. They and Tris, Will, Christina, and Al all look the same in that way. They sit next to them and Uriah asks, "How'd your private session with the leader scientist go, Tris? Well?"

"Har har har," Tris says. "She doesn't believe me, as usual."

"Of course not. It sounds preposterous," Will says. He had an arm around Christina's shoulders, relieved to have his arm around her once more. Being dead didn't have a lot of perks like that of Christina.

"She's the only one who can release us besides our doctors and parents. They all believe her. She's the only way out of here," Tris says.

"Good luck with that," Lynn says cheerlessly.

"So the way to get her to let us out is to act completely sane?" Al asks slowly.

"Well, yeah. Duh," Uriah says. He straightens between Marlene and Lynn and says, "Alas, though, the Divergent matter keeps being brought up."

"Yeah, thanks, Tris," Christina says, grinning. She punches Tris's arm.

"So the only way out of here is to lie to Jeanine and please her by making her think that she is right and we're wrong?" Tris says, sounding not at all up to this idea.

"Do you want to stay in here for the next ten years?" Uriah asks. "This is such a prison."

"We need to get out," Marlene says.

Tris doesn't say much more as they are led to their bedrooms at a little before eleven. More like prison cells. But her heart races when she thinks of who she is going to see later.

The prison cell has two sets of dressers, two beds, and two pillows. Christina takes her bed and grumbles about the usual tiny things she can't stand. Mostly it is the lack of personal touches allowed in the bedrooms, and also the lack of makeup and sane people. But Tris knows she is just miserable about being prisoner. Though, she is happy that her best friend isn't dead. That is a definite plus over the Divergent world.

"Lights out!" Tori calls out.

Tris smiles and feels in her pocket. In it are three insomnia pills. She always pulls her head back when she takes pills. These had successfully been hidden in her nose.

"Nice," Christina says. "But you gotta get rid of them before they're discovered."

"Tobias can take them out," Tris says.

Christina nods, a black shadow in the grey room. Moonlight comes through in plates against the floor, the only light in the room. "That's true," she says. She looks at the window. "When's he due?"

"Midnight," Tris says. She curls into a fetal position on her bed, holding a pillow close to her. Her grip is so tight that she is worried that she is going a little crazy. But she isn't. She is fine. She will be just fine.

She smiles. Only an hour more.

**The title is a nod to a saying from the Cheshire Cat. We're all mad here. *creepy grin***

**So they're in a mental hospital. This may be confusing, but there shall be explanation in form of PLOTTTTTTTTTTTTTT.**

**Thanks for reading!**


	2. STEALTHY STEALTHY WE'RE BEING STEALTHY

_**Soli Deo gloria**_

**DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own Divergent.  
**

Tobias sometimes surprises himself. Sometimes pleasantly, and sometimes not so. This, however, for once, is a pleasant surprise. He is able to log into and disable a security system from a tiny laptop he has in his knapsack. He keeps this knapsack on his person at all times, so that no one can find it and thus find him out. He can only imagine his father's face if he is dragged to jail for breaking and entering a mental hospital.

The entire compound is surrounded by an electronic fence. He approaches it wearing gloves, so that his fingerprints can't be found. That was Lauren's idea. He taps in the code and waits for the fence to release. It does, and he darts in smoothly. He is very lithe and unnoticeable in the dark. There are some lights, yes, but they are centered around the entrances and windows. He knows that from the ten minutes he had snuck in to check out the camera system while the guards were off getting coffee to see where the cameras were positioned. That had been about a month ago. He also knows that this is a ten minute window for him to get in, talk to Tris, and then get out without anyone being the wiser.

He waits patiently by the fence, not quite touching it. He feels adrenaline running through his veins, and his jaw tightens. He remembers how Tris had been so angry at being put into a mental hospital. He is surprised he hasn't knocked out all the security and taken her from their grasp. But no. Court orders, advised by Jeanine Matthews. After all, Tris is marked as being delusional. He knows better, though. So does Tris. She is sane as can be.

He remembers that night in their grey neighborhood that had started all this. It was a lunatic who had done the job. A guy on drugs who had taken a gun and blitzed through a block party.

He closes his eyes. He doesn't want to remember.

* * *

Several of the neighbors, many from Chicago's city council, drop dead. Bloody wounds stain their leisurely shorts and sports shirts. It is a Saturday.

Screams ring through the air. Tobias is standing with Tris near a grill, and they instantly drop to the ground. He has his arm around her back, and she slams against the ground, jarring his hold. She looks up, her head swiveling around, and she says, "Where's my family?"

Tobias's head shoots up as well, though they try to be as still as possible. If you look dead, it's a high chance that you won't get shot again. He can see Evelyn hiding against the wall of a house. Marcus is hiding behind a bush, pushing people out of his way, like they are a human shield, getting shot instead of him. He is the highest on the board, and is the most likely to get shot, if the shooter is a man who is trying to take down the council.

Still, Tobias feels a sick lurch to add to the terror in his stomach. The man is sacrificing people for himself. Then he becomes angry for locating his parents instead of Tris's. He instantly looks around, trying to not hear the screams of the scared and the gurgles of the dying drowning in their own blood. He can see Andrew Prior hurrying his wife into a house.

"Caleb," Tris whispers under her breath. She breaths unevenly, and then says, "He's gone."

"Dead?" Tobias asks.

"No. Out of sight," Tris says, sounding a little relieved.

That is good, but Tobias says, "Keep down." Tris ducks her head, but only for a second. She says, "He's crazy looking."

Tobias catches a good look of the man, hoping that he can't see _him_.

The man is surveying the mess he has made, cackling. He has a roll-up in his mouth, pumping polluting smoke into the air. Tobias can already hear the sirens.

"He's doing drugs," Tobias says, noting how the smoke smells different. It smells half between skunk and an herb. It curdles his insides and makes him fill with rage. The guy is obviously doing this while high. He needs to be stopped, too, before anyone else gets hurt.

"Keep down, Tris," Tobias says.

"What are you doing?" Tris says. "You're going to stop him?"

"Don't follow me," Tobias says.

"Don't be so sacrificial. Like hell you're going and I'm not," Tris says. A second passes before Tobias can find his voice; this gives Tris enough time to leap up and drag him behind a hedge. The guy doesn't see them, thank goodness, or else Tobias would have found more anger as he turns to Tris, who is not concentrating on him but rather on what weak spots she can find in the guy.

"Tris!" Tobias says.

"We need to get a knife from the kitchen. We can't get close enough to get them from the table. Hopefully he doesn't see them there," Tris says. She meets dark blue eyes looking sternly down at her. "I need you to act as a lookout. I need to go around the back and get a knife. Or—your gun. The one in your room."

"Tris," Tobias says, realizing that she is not going to stop and so there is little point in trying to make her stop. He can smell the drugs as the guy comes upon the front yard they are hiding in. The sirens are growing louder. The screaming has stopped. The smoke from the grill also fills the air along with the coppery smell of the blood. It is sickening and stomach churning. He has a hand on her shoulder. "Be quick. Hurry. Don't get caught."

Tris gives him a half smile and is instantly watching for the guy. He is looking away, his buzzed head looking down at the dead body at his feet. He grins a little, showing yellowing, rotten teeth in his mouth. She hurries around the side of the house, and Tobias is like a statue, watching for any movement on the murderer's part.

The man's head snaps up, and he grits his teeth. He comes toward the two, and Tris hurries. Tobias knows that he has to do something, and all he has are his fists. He knows he can knock a person out. He has learned a thing or two from Marcus.

His first punch knocks the roll-up out of the guy's mouth. He dodges a bullet aimed at his head, and the guy roars like a rabid lion. He charges at Tobias, firing at random. But Tobias, despite how angry he is and how much he'd like to land a deadly blow at the guy's head, keeps calm. He can feel his heartbeat angrily pumping blood as he ducks and kicks. His elbows are employed, and he is much skinnier and quick than the murderer. He keeps at the guy, knocking him to his back. The pistol lands a few feet away.

He lands on the guy, his teeth gritted and blood flowing from a punch or two he has received. He aches but he doesn't care as his long hands slam against the guy's big meaty hands. He keeps all his weight on his limbs, which are holding the guy down.

But then the murderer crushes his hands in his, forcing him to roll over so that he hangs over Tobias, who feels the breath knocked out of him against the ground. He remembers last the guy's foaming mouth and manic laughter as a fist is lifted and plowed into his skull.

* * *

He wakes up a few minutes later, sitting up quickly, which earns him a woozy feeling. He groans, feeling his head with his crushed and bruised hand. He feels a probably purple bruise against his skin. He feels the pounding headache, and the blood trickling down his face, and he looks up to see a medic running to him.

"What happened?" he asks.

"You're all right now. Don't worry," the medic says gently. She is a woman with brown hair tied back and an ugly scar across her face. "One of the neighbors said that you tackled the murderer. You got knocked out, though."

"Where is he?" Tobias asks suddenly, remembering everything and tasting blood in his mouth.

"The murderer? He has been identified as Reggie, but that's all we have," the medic says. "I'm Johanna Reyes, medic, and you need to lie down. I believe you have a concussion."

"WHERE is he?" Tobias says angrily.

Johanna says nothing. She just glances at the Eaton house. Tobias feels his stomach lurch. That is the house Tris has gone into.

"There's a hostage situation," she says. "Reggie rounded up some of the living and forced them into the house." She turns back to Tobias. "He works in a lab that makes serums. It is believed that he took some."

"He's smoking a roll-up," Tobias says, getting up.

"Sit down. There's nothing you can do," Johanna says.

Tobias feels everything crashing down. All around him he can hear voices and sirens. He can see the blue and red of flashing police lights, see the cars and the chief formulating a plan with a band of police officers. He sees his home's door, and knows behind it there is a crazed scientist holding a bunch of his friends and Tris, his Tris, hostage. For what reason?

"My _girlfriend _is in there," Tobias says, almost hollowly, like he can't feel anything but is shaking like a leaf.

"There is nothing you can do right now. I'm sorry. I have to tend to your wounds," Johanna says calmly. She dabs an antiseptic against his cuts and he feels nothing. Not the sting of the bacteria-killing liquid or the pain of the injuries against his body. He only feels numb, and hollow, and like he will never be whole again.

After the medic has tended to him and pronounced him well enough to stand up, Zeke comes and wraps an arm under his shoulders to keep him up.

"Stop it right now, Tobias," Zeke says.

"Stop what? Glowering?" Tobias says, his voice tight.

"Formulating a plan to break them out. The police are working on it," Zeke says. "One false move and we can get them killed. Tobias, they have my brother in there. I want him safe. Let the police do this."

"They're not doing anything. They're trying to call my house, but they won't answer. They need to _act now_," Tobias says tersely. He can feel Zeke's almost cautious hold on his tight body, which is as ready as a coil to spring.

"You sound like Tris," Zeke says quietly.

"Maybe she has a point. There's no point in wasting time," Tobias says.

"Calm down, dude. You look like you mangled your face something awful," Zeke says.

Tobias can't say anything about that. He feels like he has mucked up his face so that he doesn't even feel like himself. He has a broken nose and cuts all across his face. But they aren't anything worse from what he has experienced by the hand of Marcus. Only he never went for the face; too noticeable. He almost feels like taking off his shirt and showing Zeke a series of stripes to prove to him that he can stand pain and that he doesn't need to rest, but he needs to act. He has never felt this particular anxiety before. He feels his hands tighten into fists, and his heart is beating so much that he feels like it should explode. He knows why, though. He has never cared about someone this much before. It scares him slightly.

Lauren, Shauna, Mia, Amar, and George come up to the two of them, who are both stony-faced. Shauna is anxiety-ridden as well, and Zeke goes to hold her as she sobs dry sobs against his shoulder. Lauren says quietly, "Lynn's in there, too."

Cara is pacing, wringing her hands silently as her face keeps a poker expression, leading Tobias to know that Will is in there as well. As a matter of fact, as he looks around the front yard, he sees who is in there. Rose and Stephanie are holding back tears. Christina. There are Tris and Will and Uriah and Lynn. Hector is crying with his parents. Marlene. Peter's parents and Molly's parents and Drew's parents. Those three.

That is a lot of people. There is probable room for several casualties. He can only hope that Tris isn't one of them.

Tobias hates feeling helpless. To have this situation out of his hand, to see danger so near and not be able to do anything about it, it drives into him how weak and helpless he himself is. So all he can do is pace, his hands jarred in his pants' pockets, and look anxiously at his home. It isn't much of a home; just a house. But right now it means more to him than anything. It contains a murderer, a crazy guy on drugs, and his girlfriend and several of their friends. There is nothing he wants more that is more irrational than to rush into that house, shoot the guy dead, and have Tris safe and alive. But that is asking for too much; he'd be stopped by the police and held back by arms.

"I can't stay here. I have to do something," Tobias says, to no one but himself. But he remembers all the times that he himself has warned Tris against going into dangerous situations with nothing more than adrenaline and a fierce determination. He knows that without proper planning it will just be a suicide mission. And how he hates that there is nothing he can do.

He waits for hours, sitting on a rock in the ground and burning holes in the house. He catches snatches of conversations between police members; the chief, Max, is arguing with a few officers. He sees his mother across the street watching the house; her lips press into a thin line. He sees his coward of a father talking smoothly and getting a bandage to his arm.

Finally a squad is sent in through the back, after hours of surveillance and planning. All the neighbors are put behind a fence. Tobias manages to persuade Max to let him stay, if he doesn't interfere. That is the real challenge, to keep himself from doing something absolutely ballistic. But he is forced into the most exquisite, intimate torture as he waits, for he feels like he can die from the pressure. Marcus has never hurt him like this. He has never exploited his emotions into a disarray, transforming him into a mess. This is raw, horrible pain.

The team moves in and he hears shots. That is when he runs forward and gets caught by Max, getting angry words poured into his ears about how reckless and endangering to the mission he is. But Tobias barely hears him. His eyes are on the door.

There is a dull silence, and then a police officer opens the door and beckons for backup. Max's radio goes off, and he addresses it as Tobias flings him off and hurries to the door, sure now that the danger is past. He is surpassed by many officers who jostle him and block his view as the medics hurry in as well. He calls out for Tris, calls out for Uriah, for any noise of anyone being hurt in there. But there is no one to answer him.

People are being carried out, being walked out. Uriah is rushed by Zeke; Shauna hugs Marlene and Lynn in a sob. Christina is swept up by her little sister, and Will is caught and held in a tight vice by Cara. Tobias hurries past them all and sees Tris in a corner of his childhood home. She watches with inquisitive grey eyes, not moving, at the dead body of the murderer staining his living room rug with blood.

"Tris," he says, and she spots him. She gets up slowly and walks to him and he catches her up in his arms, hoisting her up so that her legs are clinging to his waist, her head pressed against his sharp shoulders. Her arms, tiny little limbs, grasp him like a lifeline, and he holds the two of them firmly to the ground. He clutches her like he will never see her again, and this is the last time he gets to touch her skin, feel her hair with his fingers, feel her lips pressed against his neck. For a simple moment, the two of them don't exist with anyone else. They are solely each other's, lost in a world consisting of the other and warmth and love and relief.

Then she is ripped from him into the medics' care. He is guided back by an officer offering words of caution. He barely hears the words. He can only look after her, see the haunted look in her eyes. She has seen all that, and she is not crying. She is not wracked with sobs. She is completely silent.

He has to stay to help with the reports about the murders. He is questioned about the manner of everything, and he watches as the bodies are carted off. Fences and police tape are roped around his house and the two houses that flag it.

Evelyn is not pleased by this, for she wants to live in her house. She and Marcus and Tobias have to go live in a motel for a few days. He doesn't join the two. He leaves them, not wanting to be with the two of the most tense, violent people he knows, and he lives his days in a chair by Tris's side at the hospital. She stays there for trauma and a shot to her arm. He realizes after he had hugged her she had winced, and there is blood red on his clothes.

The entire situation sets everyone off in different ways; Christina gets angrier and meaner. Will barely talks. Tris has insomnia, which is unadvised for her healing body. Lynn has horrific nightmares. Marlene wakes up crying. Tobias and his friends frequent the hospital daily only to see that while their physical injuries are healing, their minds are killing them slowly.

In comes Jeanine Matthews and her revolutionary new drug. It has flown through animal testing with ease, and after much talking and deliberation, Tobias watches with a cautious, wary heart as Jeanine, all sharp and precision, inserts a syringe in Tris's neck.

Days pass with different effects. Christina relaxes and makes Will tell jokes and laugh. Girls get peaceful sleep. But Jeanine is extremely displeased. The doctors note their progress and Tobias inquires after Tris's health report and sees that she is improving vastly, but still, Jeanine keeps talking about how if they aren't put under her surveillance that they can be a danger to themselves. "Soon, if they are not completely healed, they can be a danger to others around them," she says. As if that can seal the deal.

It does, though. Tris and her friends are moved to a mental hospital after Uriah begins talking about paint-balling and flying off a building into a net covered hole. The others concur with him with different instances. No one knows why they see these images in their minds, but they are convinced they are real.

* * *

Only recently has Tris told Tobias that she has pinpointed where she had been killed in a haze of poison and bullets. He has no idea why she is convinced this . . . Divergent world exists, but he doesn't question her. She believes it is true, and somehow, he believes her. He believes her enough that he knows she isn't insane, no matter what Jeanine tells him, like it is law.

She isn't insane, and he knows that completely.

Midnight comes. His watch beeps. He catches sight of the lights and avoids them as he quickly comes below the window of Tris and Christina's room. He slips the window open using a few choice tools. The wires to the security are taken care of quickly. It opens with a click, and so he opens the window until he can't anymore.

"Tris?" he whispers.

"Tobias!" she says.

He tosses in his knapsack of technics and then eases himself easily through the window. He lands on a spot in front of a dresser, and to his right is Tris's bed. She tosses aside the pillow she holds and she says, holding his face between her tiny hands, "They have visitation hours, you know."

"They expelled me, remember?" Tobias says. He had created a ruckus the first week of Tris's imprisonment: he had punched a couple of orderlies.

"Small details," Tris says, and she kisses him.

For a small, beautiful moment, the stealth of his mission and the tension he has kept up until then slips away. He is instead feeling her skin against his, her heart pounding against his. His thumb plays against her cheek, a wisp of hair getting caught between his gloved fingers. He smiles against her lips.

"GAG! Get a room," Christina says, laughing and making the situation lose its secrecy, its darkness and mystery and romance.

Tris pulls away from him, her hands fluttering down to his shoulders. She is frowning. "Can't. I have to share a room with you instead."

"I'm the better option for a roomie, though," Christina says. "After all, can Tobias coordinate six different colored makeups into a perfectly fit makeover?"

"I would think that there would be a lack of makeup in a mental hospital," Tobias says in his quiet voice. He is being humorous, but his tone and his manner are all serious. He feels something in him ache as he takes in the sight of his tiny Tris in grey clothes, the prisoner clothes of a mental patient. Something in him grows then, something incredibly burning and hostile. He wants to get her out, _now_.

"Tobias, I need to get out of here. Just being around crazy people is making me crazy," Tris says.

Christina mockingly gasps at being called crazy and "Is now a good time?" he asks.

"For getting me out?" Tris asks, surprised. "Tobias, we can't leave all our friends here." She swallows and breaths. "Besides, we need to stage something so big that the police will think there's a good reason for a bunch of mental patients to check out early."

"Yeah, as themselves. Not their doctors or parents doing the job," Tobias says, sighing.

"What if he gets accused of kidnapping? You know the stupid system will think he's the mastermind of an escape plan," Christina says.

"I _would _be the mastermind of a plan to get you out," Tobias says.

"Create a plan then, Tobias, or else we're stuck here forever and ever," Christina says. She yawns and says, "Night, guys." She turns over onto her side, her back facing the two of them, leaving them a little privacy as the two focus their attention only on the face across from them.

"How you holding up?" Tobias asks.

"I'm surviving. It sucks here," Tris says, with a short, curt laugh. She grows serious and angry. "I want to punch Caleb's face in."

Tobias's fingers trace her collarbone, and he feels her anger in his own heart. He can't understand why her brother is conspiring against her like this. He is an intern under Jeanine's jurisdiction, and is not helping in the case of getting Tris out of here. "Ignore him. Have your parents come to visit you?"

"Not today," Tris says. Natalie and Andrew Prior usually visit her three or four times a week, depending on their work schedule. Every time, Tris begs them to get her out of here. But each time Jeanine drops in on their visiting and explains in technical, complicated medical terms how Tris is still not mentally ready to return to normal life. "Even then, they still believe Jeanine. I can't believe they believe her over their own daughter."

"They want to believe you, I'm sure, Tris, but they know that she is a professional. They think she knows more about your medical status than even you do," Tobias says.

Tris sighs and grips his wrist with a steely hand. "Don't leave me here for long."

He presses a kiss against her temple, lingering there for a few seconds of his dwindling time. "I'll get you out. I promise."

**:)**


End file.
